CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Histoires d’Amour

(Love Stories from French Women)

Love is a canvas furnished by nature and embroidered by imagination.

—VOLTAIRE

FRENCH WOMEN OFTEN USE THE EXPRESSION “my love story.” I don’t think this idea of a “love story” is a translation issue, but rather, it’s simply the way they think. Their love life is a story. It’s artful and it’s always evolving and changing.

If you think about love in this way, you see the long view. There is no “goal” of getting a boyfriend or getting married, but rather there is a beautiful story that’s unique and perfect in its own way.

I’ve talked to many French women and men, and their stories of how they met are all very interesting. They meet in a variety of ways—a glance across the metro platform leads to a chance encounter the next day and then a rendezvous in the park. Many of my French women friends meet through introductions from other friends. I know several women who have met their boyfriends at workshops. Cooking classes seem to be a particularly fertile crowd for romance. My friend Isabelle met her husband at a family party. And Isaure met a wonderful man in the middle of a rainstorm in the Marais, where they were huddled together under an awning, getting soaking wet and laughing.

NON, JE NE REGRETTE RIEN!

Not too long ago, the photographer Krystal Kenney told me her love story. She’s a beautiful girl with long auburn hair and blue-blue eyes. She really looks as if she walked out of a poster advertising the beautiful people of Ireland, but she’s actually an American from suburban Maryland. She reminds me a little of my daughter, who’s also a photographer (now a graphic designer). They’re around the same age, and so I feel an immediate rapport with Krystal. She’s been living in Paris for the past four years.

She arrived in Paris after graduating from university during the 2008 economic crisis in America.

“With a boatload of student debt and no real job prospects in sight, it seemed like the perfect time to throw caution to the wind and take a vacation in Europe. Six countries later and no richer, I was back in America with what I like to call reverse culture shock. I quickly realized that out of all the countries I visited, France had my heart, and I had to find a way to get back and make my life there.”

Krystal returned back home once more, full of new energy and ambition. She took five different jobs while running her own photography company, cleared out all her student debt, sold her car, moved to Paris, and became a full-time photographer.

Krystal has photographed some pretty famous people, such as the writers John Irving and Michael Chabon as well as the American ambassador to Paris and the singer Jimmy Buffett. I feel very fortunate to be in such stellar company!

Oh, and she’s also brilliant at finding the secret and not-so-secret spots to stage our photo shoot.

This morning, we’ve been prancing around the Palais Royale, and Krystal has taken dozens of photos of me, posing in the gardens, switching hats and scarves, and turning from left to right, changing from close-up shots to me in the distance with an entire garden behind me.

And now we are relaxing with our café crème at Café Nemours.

Krystal tells me about her romantic life in Paris. She explains how it has opened her mind and heart to new adventures.

“When we carry on the same routines daily in an environment we are accustomed to, we miss so much. When you are constantly stimulated by trying to figure out a language, a new city, a new group of humans, our brain is fluttering with activity and jumps out of autopilot into reality and possibilities.”

Oh, and the possibilities of finding new love!

“I met my boyfriend, Jacques, in a very strange way. I was on my way from photographing a gala. By the end of the night, I was enjoying some of the perks of photographing parties, which included a few glasses of free champagne. After a fun night of dancing and meeting new people, I was feeling energized and happy as I made my way to the metro platform.

“As the train approached a handsome, tall brunette stepped up next to me. I felt a shock of energy run through my body as I watched him in my peripheral vision.

“I took care to sit across from him on the metro so I could look closer, but not too close. I kept staring at him in the reflection of the metro window.

“Every few stops his eyes would lock with mine in the reflection and we would both smile and look away.

“My stop arrived, and he got off first. And by coincidence this was my stop, too! I began to walk in the opposite direction up the stairs, but stopped one last time to look over my shoulder and smile at this handsome young man.

“And then he turned around at exactly the same moment. We locked eyes, and he turned around to approach me. ‘Bonjour,’ he said with a coy smile.”

Krystal and Jacques lived happily together for over two years. And yes, there was quite a bit of drama here and there, but there was also some true romance for our young photographer. Jacques helped Krystal navigate French customs, administration, and the language. They traveled together throughout Europe and truthfully this was a fairy-tale story—the American and the quintessential French man. In the end, their love story came to an end, but Krystal is quite young and she is happy to be on her own once again with, perhaps, her true love—Paris.

LOVE ACROSS THE CONTINENTAL DIVIDE

Ondine is a clothing designer and style consultant. She’s working on a memoir told through shoes, and that alone makes me adore her! Ondine is originally from the South of France, but I first met her in Boston, where she was designing clothes for performers and patrons of the arts. She received her clients at her atelier on Beacon Street, where she was (and still is) an image consultant. She’s helped hundreds of women and men who felt fashionably challenged or just wanted to freshen up their look. Oh, and if that wasn’t enough—she also works as a plus-size model.

LOVE IN PARIS

Ondine is a luscious and very feminine woman, with an engaging smile and lots of joie de vivre. She tells me that her signature fragrance is Shalimar, but she wears Yves Saint Laurent’s Manifesto when she’s feeling especially bold. She just makes you feel happy to be alive, and happy to be in Paris, sitting at the Café Roc with her, discussing life and style and fashion and perfume, and of course, love.

Here’s what she told me about meeting the love of her life:

“It was a Saturday in November, and I was having the best hair day of my life.

“I had been to see Sebastien de Paris, who received clients at a posh salon on Avenue Franklin Roosevelt in the eighth arrondissement. I walked out of the salon feeling like the cutest girl in Paris. I was supposed to go on a date with a Russian count (Boris) that night, but he was called away to Stockholm, so I decided to join my girlfriends at the pub for a birthday celebration.

“I must have been exuding a very charming vibe with my new coupe (haircut) because I was chatting with three guys at once when Jérôme walked in. I saw him immediately (he’s tall) over the other guys’ heads, and we made eye contact. I was struck by his big dark eyes and full eyebrows. He’s classically handsome, almost in an old-fashioned way. Just picture Gregory Peck plus Sean Connery. And when he smiled, his whole face got involved, especially his eyes. Also, I loved his long arms and legs, his hands and broad shoulders.

“Obviously, something happened. Was it love at first sight? I don’t know. I only know that I had a feeling we had met before and that he was a sweet person.

“We were introduced by a mutual friend (who was drunk at the time and didn’t remember the fateful incident at all). Jérôme asked me if I’d like to go out, but I was no longer living in Paris. I was only back for a fortnight and then I would return to Boston. Still, he wasn’t dissuaded.

“We met for coffee the next day. I had dinner plans with friends, so I arranged to meet him a couple of hours before. We met at Metro Saint-Paul and walked to a nearby café, where we stared at each other, smiling, over espresso. He was wearing a gray sweater. The collar was stretched out, and I could see his neck and his collarbone. I loved how this view of his neck was so beguiling and exciting—a hint of things to come, perhaps. It was sexy and yet discreet and natural.

“After coffee, we walked hand in hand to meet up with my friends. He kissed me good night and left. When he was out of earshot, my friends declared, ‘Il est mignon!’ (‘He is darling!’) and asked how long we’d been dating.

“Two hours.

“Later that night, during dinner with my friends in the Marais, Jérôme sent me a text. He didn’t want to disturb me but he had to tell me that he was ‘sur un petit nuage’ (floating on a little cloud).

“After this, we went out every day for the next week (strolls in Le Jardin du Luxembourg, Île Saint-Louis, pizza on Rue des Canettes), and finally it was time for me to return to Boston. I had already fallen for him and was heartbroken that our story would be over.

“‘I’ll come to Boston,’ he said.

“‘Sure,’ I sobbed, thinking I would never see him again.

“Three weeks later we were reunited at Logan Airport. He had never been to the States before. His English was . . . shaky.

“He later confided that he was terrified I wouldn’t be there to meet him. We commuted between Paris and Boston for two years and eventually married each other in 2010 on three different continents. Our son, Logan Charles, was born the following year, and two years later, our daughter, Paloma. The name Charles is to honor my father, Charles, who passed away six weeks after we were married in his house in Thailand. People often ask us if Logan is named for the airports—Boston Logan and Paris Charles de Gaulle. After all, they were the hubs of our lives for many years, so that’s a bonus significance!

“This November will be the tenth anniversary of my very best hair day ever!”

LOVE FINDS YOU

Nicole, my Parisian friend with the beautiful voice—the one who took me to La Mascotte for dinner in Paris—recently joined me at French Roast in the West Village in New York City. Oh, and she introduced me to her husband, Angel.

Angel is a soft-spoken fellow and doesn’t speak much English, and so while Nicole and I chattered away, he quietly looked on and listened and probably understood a lot more than he let on, because his eyes were very bright and he smiled and nodded and I thought, how lucky for Nicole to have such a sweet man as her life partner. Nicole told me that they met as children. They grew up in the same village in the southwest of France and Nicole was friends with Angel’s older sisters. They didn’t really go out in the same circles, because while Nicole was seventeen, Angel was only fourteen—a million years’ difference in teen years. And so she didn’t really notice him.

However, Angel noticed Nicole. He leans forward and tells me how he admired this “older woman.” She is très élégante. Differente. Very cool. Stylish. So, it would seem that even in high school, Nicole was destined for a life in Parisian fashion and not a life in the country. But Angel had such a big crush on her, he simply never forgot about her.

Years went by and Nicole moved to Paris, and they lost track of one another and went on with their lives. They didn’t see each other for over thirty years, until one day Angel’s sisters phoned Nicole from their home village to say that they’d love to get together again, after all these years. And they mentioned that their younger brother had recently divorced. Nicole had never married. Still, she didn’t understand why Angel’s sister would want her to meet with her brother. She hadn’t really known Angel in school, but then Angel invited her out to dinner, and so she accepted the invitation and arrangements were made.

A week later, Nicole returned to her family’s village and she met Angel and they went to dinner at a nice restaurant. Nicole tells me that their village is very much like my favorite village, Auvillar—with its ancient buildings and artistic community. That night over dinner, Nicole learned that since she last saw Angel, when he was a young man, he’d become a martial art master and was the French champion for tae kwon do six years in a row and had traveled to Korea for competitions. So in the intervening years, Angel had grown into a very interesting and successful man.

And Nicole and Angel love to visit the States. They married on the beach in Cape Cod on June 1, 2014, thanks to their American friends.

Nicole and Angel have been together for fourteen years, but because of work they do not actually live together. Still, Nicole assures me that France has a very good network of airplanes and speed trains, so they easily meet in Paris or the South of France by the Mediterranean coast.

When I ask the couple if they would like to offer any advice to my American readers on how to find love, here’s how they replied:

“We are very different. All those differences nourish our relationship. Our encounter, after all those years, was completely unexpected. You have to stay open-minded and let life surprise you. Things happen when you least expect them to happen. Never give up. You don’t find love when you’re searching for it. Love finds you!”

OH, CANADA!

Ever since my first book, French Women Don’t Sleep Alone, came out, people ask me about what happened to “the girl in the skirt and boots.” That girl is my good friend Jessica Lee. She came with me to France in 2007 as my translator. She had just finished a really difficult year.

“I had managed to extract myself from a destructive and manipulative relationship that had nearly killed my spirit and had left me with no self-confidence; a close friend died of cancer, and I also lost my grandmother, to whom I was very close.”

In this fragile state, Jessica began our trip wearing jeans and T-shirts and ended it by wearing skirts and boots and flirting like a French woman. But, more than this, it wasn’t long before she found true love. Here’s her beautiful love story in her own words:

“The trip to France changed my way of thinking. I listened to the women we met with great interest. They were romantic but pragmatic. Their relationships were also friendships, and had started as friendships, or quasi-friendships, or friend-of-a-friend friendships, whereas my relationships had always started out as individual encounters with strangers that became romantic.

“When I met Marc, I was just beginning my second year as a French teacher and was at a language conference, passing through the exhibitors’ floor, when I noticed a sign that read FRENCH! IN CANADA! The table really had the worst possible placement: a desolate little corner. ‘I’ll come talk to you,’ I said. He stood up. ‘Please do.’

“I remember that we talked about French immersion and Canadian health care. He remembers that we talked about anything and everything and that I made fun of him for having a PC. During that conversation, it suddenly dawned on me that he was very handsome . . . his broad smile, his brown eyes, framed in squarish blue glasses. He also spoke French and English perfectly, and he wasn’t wearing a ring. Hmmm, I thought, and listened with increasing interest.

“The next morning, I drove back to the conference, made a beeline for the exhibitors’ floor, and then pretended to wander around casually, as if I hadn’t come just for him. I was on a tight schedule. I had a plan. ‘Hey, you’re Canadian,’ I said. ‘You don’t know anyone here. And you speak French. I am going to a party tonight with a bunch of French people. You should come.’ I handed him my card. A few hours later, I received a text accepting my invitation.

“At the party, he seemed to talk to everyone but me. ‘He’s off my list,’ I told my friend Isaure, making a scratching motion.

“However after that, the notes started arriving. Within a month, we were talking on the phone, and another month later, I went to see him in Canada.

“That first night, we went to dinner and talked and talked and talked. The waiter came with the food, and it just sat on the plates. Time streamed by and then they closed the restaurant. I remember a still-full plate being taken away. I didn’t even feel hungry. The weekend continued that way. Conversation flowed easily and fluidly, unlike the other dates I had had throughout my lifetime, where it felt like a bad tennis match, or worse, an inquisition, searching for something to ask in order to find some common ground. With him, I didn’t have to think about what I was saying. There seemed to be endless topics to cover.

“I went home feeling great, but also hesitant. He was extremely inconvenient: divorced with two young kids, and rooted in a different country that was an eight-hour drive or a plane ride away. I tried not to think about him. I even tried to meet other people in my own country, but Canada, as I called him, was just too interesting, too nice, too smart, too funny, too present. He was always on my mind. And then I finally gave in to chance. I had decided that I needed to risk in order to love, and if love included the possibility of hurt, so be it.

“We started a long-distance romance, flying back and forth once or twice a month for nearly three years. When he asked me to come to Canada, it was a huge decision: leave my country, my family, my friends, everything I knew. But I loved him. It seemed like I had waited my entire life to meet him. Being with Marc made me realize that I had never really been myself with anyone else. With him, it was easy; it wasn’t like pushing a boulder uphill.

“My father had always told me, ‘Just do what you do and eventually you will probably notice the right person doing it right alongside you.’ He was right.”

Say yes—to the unknown, to the possibility of getting hurt. Just say yes.

Today, Jessica and Marc are married and live with his two remarkable boys. Jessica is an editor, a French teacher, and a brilliant translator.

SAY YES

As it turns out, the day I brought the big pink lilies to my French friend Sylvie would be the last time I saw her, the girl who started it all. I don’t tell you this to make you sad, but just to remind you that our time in this world is limited and to suggest that when you see those flowers and a group of French ladies laughing and gesturing for you to join them and pick out some flowers, you should say yes.

Just say yes, even though it might seem strange and you’re not exactly sure what these French ladies are saying to you.

Just say yes, even though you’ve already bought a box of chocolates and this would be just one more thing to carry through the streets of Paris.

Just say yes, even though you don’t have wrapping paper or a ribbon for those flowers.

Just say yes, even though there’s the danger of getting yellow pollen smudged on your pretty white American blouse. In fact, that’s especially when you say yes to the flowers, to the world, to your friends, to your man, to life. Know this: there will be times in your life when you are offered something lovely, but there will be pollen and there will be the certain danger that you will find yourself forever marked, forever changed.

Still, say yes.

Parisian Charm School Lesson

Be open to the possibility of the unexpected surprise.

You are living your own true, unique love story. Love yourself. Love the people around you and love life. Embrace the idea that you have all the time in the world because your love story will unfold in its own special way.

Consider the circuitous path to finding the love of your life as part of the delicious journey. Take a step back from goal-oriented dating and think of your love life in the long view. Relax, knowing that love is whimsical and unpredictable.

Be open to the possibility of the unexpected surprise. And create your own beautiful love story. And finally, throw out the idea of perfection.

Parisian Charm School Pratique

Very simple. Trust your heart. Say yes. And bring the flowers.